


Skyward

by flecksofpoppy



Series: Marco Bodt Appreciation Week 2016 [1]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Ficlet, Gen, M/M, Marco Bodt Appreciation Week, canonverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-08
Updated: 2016-02-08
Packaged: 2018-05-19 00:43:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5949616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flecksofpoppy/pseuds/flecksofpoppy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Why are you looking at the sky, Marco? </i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Skyward

**Author's Note:**

> For Marco Bodt Appreciation Week!
> 
> Prompt: Growing Up

Marco likes to climb trees, look up at the stars through decades-old branches spreading far and wide, shimmy up past the birds’ nests and knots in the trunk.

His youngest sisters says: _Why do you look at the sky so much, Marco?_

His oldest sister says: _Get down here and help me peel these potatoes._

But both of them are kind, and both of them pat his shoulder with a smile. 

Jinae is a warm place, no matter how cold the snow is when it falls nor when water freezes in the porcelain bowl on the vanity.

Marco learns, spring after spring, that birds that fall out of the nest are usually abandoned; but sometimes, they might be replaced.

Sometimes.

= = =

Marco imagines what Jean Kirschstein might have been like as a little boy, if they’d known each other as children.

He’s pretty sure that Jean would’ve been the kid that chucked mud at everyone else.

But nonetheless, smarmy smile, blushes over girls, lizard chasing asshole that he is, Marco becomes his friend.

Between brown bread the first night and sadly aligned stars the night before graduation, he counts Jean as a friend. His best friend, to be precise.

They teach each other things: how to fly on wires (Jean is good at it); how to make a salve out of herbs and wax (Marco knows).

But mostly, how to be patient.

= = =

“Jean,” Marco gasps, feeling childish as soon as he says it. They both stop short on a branch, staring down; Marco because of what he sees, and Jean because he’s startled.

“What?” he asks with wide eyes, taken aback, slight miffed they’ve been slowed down in a training exercise, but willing to stop nonetheless.

“No, go ahead...” Marco says, laughing awkwardly, shaking his head as Connie and Sasha fly by, whooping away the morning with their speed. It’s so close to graduation that everyone has been crunching, refining any weaknesses, and no one quite expected Connie Springer to be as good as he is at the quick turns.

“What are you _talking_ about?” Jean demands, rolling his eyes as he stands on the branch, staring at Marco in outrage. “You asked me to stop, so say what the hell you mean.”

“A bird fell out of the nest,” Marco blurts, feeling even more ridiculous.

“You’re losing it,” Jean immediately retorts, huffing and tapping Marco on the shoulder reprovingly.

“I told you go ahead.”

Jean just stares at him, but then stops. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

Marco grits his teeth, shaking his head, and somewhere in his gut... he just knows that this is important. That vulnerable things get tipped out of the nest, that sometimes people fall, that sometimes...

“You want me to go down and get it, don’t you?”

Marco blinks.

“Wait... what?”

Jean huffs again, rolling his eyes skyward and making an exasperated sound. “You want me to go get that... baby bird thing that fell, don’t you?”

“How’d you know that—”

Jean grins. “Good thing I’m better than you at ODM, you softie,” and then he’s gone with a whoosh of his gear and a smirk that makes Marco’s heart beat faster.

It’s only about 30 seconds until he’s back, but he looks less confident.

“I can’t find it,” he says, shaking his head. “You know about that stuff...”

Marco leaps down next, ignoring the cadets that go sailing past, staring at them. He hangs close to the forest floor, but sees nothing except grass.

He remembers climbing up through branches and birds’ nests, scrambling through to reach stars, but all he sees as he slowly reigns himself back up is Jean’s anxious expression.

“Why do you look down so much?” Jean whispers as Marco comes back up to stand on the branch next to him, tears pricking at his eyes, even though he doesn’t know why.

“Get your heads out of the clouds, Jean,” Marco whispers, pulling Jean against him now that the other cadets have passed. “We have to ground ourselves.”

Jean stiffens, but then slowly embraces him in return.

“Shut up,” he tells Marco, pulling him close, “and stop noticing the things that don’t matter. Shit that makes you sad, when you don’t have to.”

= = = 

_Why are you looking at the sky, Marco?_

**Author's Note:**

> I have a [tumblr](http://flecksofpoppy.tumblr.com/)!
> 
> And so does [Marco Bodt Appreciation Week](http://marcobodtappreciationweek.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
